Divisions debate down to Indiana, Purdue

The Big Ten's future division alignment is taking shape. Barring a late shift in the discussions between athletic directors and league officials, the only question to sort out is: Will Indiana or Purdue move West?

League sources have told ESPN.com that the Big Ten, as expected, will go with a geographic split for its divisions in 2014. As we first reported last month, time zones are expected to divide the divisions. The only problem: eight Big Ten schools are located in the Eastern time zone, including future members Maryland and Rutgers, while just six are located in the Central time zone.

"East" division

Maryland
Michigan
Michigan State
Ohio State
Penn State
Rutgers
Purdue or Indiana

I think the Big Ten East will be similar to how the SEC West has been the last few years. It will be stacked compared to the other division and will win the championship game most years. Moreover, with the way Michigan and Ohio State have been recruiting, I could see The Game having national championship implications many years similar to Alabama and LSU the last few years.

The East is brutal compared to the West. That being said, we were going to be playing OSU and MSU every year anyway. I personally don't think Penn State is going to be as down as long as everyone thinks. They held on to some nice pieces of a recruiting class that can get them through the NCAA santions. There coach is doing a pretty nice job over there.

If we've learned anything from the past 5 years, it's that when your two-deep is not made up primarily of scholarship players, you're bound to struggle regardless how talented your starters. Penn State is in for some lean years, bank on it.

I wasn't a dick about it. It's not a hard thing to take a few minutes of your (not your life, but you know) life and learn the proper usage of a few of the most commonly used words in our language. It's how we communicate, it's kind of a big deal.

Again, I wasn't dickish at all and I usually am not. I will continue to address the most egregious mis-spelled words and poor grammar, as I always have. In a non asshole/douchebag way, though my sig would say otherwise.

It's hardly hurtful to have someone correct a grammatical mistake, whether it was due to ignorance or not. Developing good writing habits comes in handy when making an impression on potential employers, among many other things. I don't see why this correction is unjust.

I agree with all this. Plus, Penn State has a recruiting situation in PA much like OSU's situation in OH. Only big time program in a football rich state. Then throw in New Jersey, which also belongs to them. Then throw in massive regional sympathy. Penn State will be back sooner than people think. That will be good for the Big Ten. And we will still beat them virtualy every year. So that will be fun.

I also agree that the brutal portion of our conference is mainly composed of teams we were playing anyway. This is good stuff.

Pennsylvania is hardly the talent rich state that Ohio is. And according to Rivals, in the three years leading up to PSU's sanctions, they signed six of New Jersey's top 60 players. So how do they own New Jersey?

Perhaps recruits had problems relating to a geriatric head coach that didn't actively do any recruiting near the end of his tenure.

There is no doubting that Paterno was an all-time great coach (as far as the football side of things - not trying to discuss the other stuff here), but there is also little doubt that he wasn't as good at coaching and recruiting during his last 15 years or so as he was during the 70s and 80s. Penn State is a program with a lot of cachet, and I think that under a good coach they could quickly regain their status as the dominant program in the northeast. I see them as a program like Texas from 1984-97 (overall record 92-68-3) or USC from 1991-2000 (65-52-3). At the end of those runs of mediocrity, Texas brought in Mack Brown and USC brought in Pete Carroll, and those coaches almost immediately restored those schools' historical dominance.

These are fair criticisms, so let me adjust. Historically, New Jersey has been PSU country. Not the best state for recruits, but not terrible either. And while Pennsylvania is not Ohio, it's pretty good, too. I was not predicting that PSU would be at OSU's level, but that they will bounce back better and quicker than people think.

My point is that Penn State is still seen as a "power program," just one going through a down cycle. If Bill O'Brien turns out to be a good long-term coach, it's likely that PSU will once again "own" NJ, since they are the premier program in that area.

Penn State is a sleeping giant. They are the headline program in the talent rich area of PA, NJ, and DC/Baltimore.

He was a legend, but people do not realize how much JoePa held that program back his last decade or so. Unshackled, they will become a national power again with a top-level coaching staff and aggressive recruiting. We have seen the last of 9 straight wins over them.

What does help mitigate this in our favor is the sanctions and Michigan and Ohio State now being in the East. It buys us just enough time to get ourselves positioned as an "Eastern" program in the minds of PA, NJ, and DC/Baltimore recruits.

Penn State is, by far, the biggest program east of Columbus and north of the SEC. Paterno wasn't coaching, recruiting, or doing home visits anymore. He was a massive boat anchor for that program. Larry Johnson Jr, Rod Vanderlinden, and Tom Bradley basically dragged it as far as it could go.

Having lived on the east coast (near Penn State territory), I can tell you that they are just about the only major college football program with any semblence of winning tradition in the whole northeast section of the country. They pretty much have PA, NJ, NY, New England, and a good stake in Maryland all to themselves.

They're also really the only school with a devoted following / a following that actually cares. No one cares about Rutgers, no one cares about Syracuse or UConn football, and Maryland football sucks. And that's the entire story of college football over there

I think people cared about Syracuse when they were good, but they're dropping into the "haven't been good for so long they might as well never have been good in the first place" category that Washington is occupying, that Pitt is close to, and that Tennessee is getting nervous about.

For Penn State, its biggest drawback is that it's a total PITA to get to and relatively "country" as Terrelle Prior said in, perhaps, his most lucid statement. It doesn't hurt them much in football recruiting because of the lack of competition in the Northeast, but it kills them in basketball.

This helps us. We are no longer the team playing the toughest schedule in our Division every single year while our Divisional competition skates by 4 out of 6 years. If Penn State gets good soon, OSU and MSU will have to deal with it the same as we will.

Easy. Purdue has a rivalry with Iowa, Indiana has a rivlary with MSU. Plus these divisions are already competitively skewed eastward (especially if MSU stays decent). The only reason not to put Indiana in the east is they'll never win another conference game.

In the the 50s and 60s, Purdue/MSU, not Indiana/MSU, was the big rivalry. I don't believe that has really changed through the years. Purdue would regularly beat a much better MSU and/or Notre Dame team. Hence the moniker, the Purdue "Spoilermakers". If you ask II I The

I think they want Northwestern in the west for media reasons, ie, the east has teams in both the New York and Chicago media markets, they fear the west will receive even less coverage than it already will with the league's three biggest brands in the east.

Geez.....Just glad we're in the East. Teams in the West will only get regular exposure in Chicago, as far as dense recruiting hotbeds go. Seems like the alignment heavily favors East teams from a recruiting standpoint...which....Yea for us!!! Wonder if Nebraska is pissed?

Why? If Wisconsin reverts back to their old ways, then Nebraska will play in the B1G championship game almost every year. If they need more spice to their schedule in years they don't play UM, Ohio and/or PSU in crossover games, they can schedule an SEC team or another football power in a non-conference game.

None of this really matters, since it seems almost inevitable that we're expanding by at least another 2 teams and those teams are in all likelihood coming from the East. The time zone split isn't going to hold up long term.

The truth is that we'll add two east coast schools (UVA and maybe UNC) and those will have to stay east and then Purdue and Indiana will both go west and the new schools will have to stay east to creat east coast rivalries

Well it will be the other Indiana team and then somebody else. The big debate when we expand to 16 and decide to keep East / West divisions will be what team to shift from the East to the West. Assuming two east coast schools being added, the 'westernmost" school in the East divsion would be MSU. This also leads to 8 original Big 10 schools being lumped into the West divison and Michigan and OSU being placed in the East with all the newbies, which probably won't pass the aesthetic test.

When we expand again, we may have to settle for a non-geograhic divisional breakdown again.

Of all the things that have made CFB worse over the past decade+, expansion is the worst. We now have to play Rutgers & Maryland every single year. Let that sink in. Who needs Wisconsin, Iowa, Minnesota. Gimme Rutgers and Maryland! Can't wait to load up the car and head out to New Jersey! The sad thing is adding a couple more southeastern teams makes it worse. We'd still be stuck geographically while IU/PU and maybe MSU move to the west.

I hear what you're saying, and I understand it, but it might also be a good move for the future of the program to go east. Think of the exposure the east coast holds, and the fertile recruiting grounds it holds. It's tough for a fanbase and school as old as UM see some of the old traditions go away, but it's either adapt or go by the wayside and become more and more irrelevent.

Try most MOST of the old traditions go away. Goodbye century+ old rivalries. Goodbye midwest culture and rabid fanbases. Hello New Jersey? New Fucking Jersey?!!!! Not only is our new division way more difficult, I can't even feel good about pounding. I live in NYC and don't know a single person who went to Rutgers. I know a lot of people I can taunt after we beat up on Indiana, Purdue and every other B1G school east of Pennsylvania.

and know a ton of people who went to Rutgers, a school with nearly 350,000 alumni and over 55,000 students. I know most people here are not thrilled with Rutgers, and orginally I wasn't either. But they've done very well establishing a respectable program over the last decade (I know, Big East, rabble rabble). And most of the people I know who went to Rutgers are thrilled to be moving to the B1G and expect many of their bigger games (home games against M, OSU, and PSU) to be held at MetLife Stadium (NY Giants and Jets, can hold roughly 85k). Give them a chance before we completely bash them. I'm not making an argument for them to be a top national contender every year (and I most certainly hope they never get there), but I honestly don't see why people think Rutgers is going to be a worse program than Minnesota/Purdue/Iowa over the next decade (which only makes me upset because yes our division is going to be way more difficult than the west).

Call me an old-timer (I'm only 26), but I just don't give a damn about playing Maryland even if, as a DC resident, I get to see Michigan once every other year in town.

I just don't care about Maryland or Rutgers, whereas I actually do care about the rich history Michigan has playing teams like Minnesota and Iowa. I like Kinnick Stadium's pink locker room and I like the Jug.

For example, Maryland fans can't even fill their own basketball arena unless they're playing Duke, where the inferiority complex is even worse than Michigan State fans. Maryland's football stadium will look a lot like Northwestern's when it comes to hosting conference foes since none of them give a damn about Maryland football. They're fair weather fans at best.

It was never a matter of the B1G not having bad programs. The difference is that Mich has been playing Minn since 1892, not 2014. There is no history, nor rivalry, nor much appeal like there would be when Nebraska joined. Rutgers is a non-conference cupcake to start the season.

That I know my rant today has been done a thousand times already, my only point is that I'm disappointed with the new division allignment.

I've never been a fan of Penn State and didn't want them in the B1G. Now we have them and the two commercial additions that nobody wanted. I wish we could have swapped out Nebraska for Penn St. and split Maryland and Rutgers between the divisions.

I understand the thought process behind the new divisions, I just wish they went a different way.

I would have loved the "Eye" divisional alignment that was discussed here and by the B1G. But even that would have cost us the Minny-Wisco-Iowa games. I'm curious what would have pleased you (given that expansion is a reality), because it seems almost illogical to have done it in any other way.

Let's see how things play out. I really hope the "cupcake" doesn't, you know, win very often. New Jersey and Maryland produces some pretty great football talent and they'll have a somewhat easier job keeping a bunch of these players.

Change is hard and we all feel this. But since change is here, this is not a bad scenario for us. Can I see us having a real rivalry with Rutgers? It feels odd, but the answer may be yes. Recruiting wise this is a massive boon for us: New Jersey, Virginia, and North Carolina. This will help us be a national championship contending team.

I still wish the change didn't have to happen. But evidently it does. If we look to the future rather than the past, though, it's pretty bright for the block M.

and at this point, I admit I'm just holding on to the past even though it was taken from us, Michigan doesn't need Rutgers to recruit the NY area. It doesn't need Maryland to recruit the VA/DC area. What this means is that we're playing schools that no one wants instead of playing the schools where my family and friends went to college. This makes it more difficult to travel to games and now I can't talk as much smack.

Gotta disagree. I believe traditional powers in particular benefit by playing in large away game markets. The local stud recruits get a easy trip to check out the program. Just because our recruiting is good now doesn't mean it can't get even better through more exposure.

"Can I see us having a real rivalry with Rutgers? It feels odd, but the answer may be yes." Absolutely not. Rutgers wasn't even a real football team until less than a decade ago and now you want to concede that Michigan would stoop to their level and become rivals? Are you insane? This is Michigan, one of the top ten football programs in the nation, if not top 5.

And you're going to say that we're rivals with Rutgers? The commuter school somewhere in New Jersey (who the hell knows where is anyone's guess...) with a HS gym for their basketball arena, a team that will play 1/2 it's "home" games in an NFL stadium, and a fan base that includes the Jersey Shore cast and that's it (unless you're a fool and want to believe Delaney's verbal diarhea that they bring the NY market).

This expansion is a damn shame with piss-poor teams joining and is an absolute embarassmentto the Big Ten. You think the Big Ten is now a better brand / football conference now that we added that 53rd and 88th best football teams from last year? We're falling farther and farther behind and not catching up soon. What recruit wants to play in the West? What exciting games will there be? NONE. About as exciting as the MAC + one good team (have to figure either Wisc. or Neb. will be decent every year).

The traditionalist in me would rather have Wisconsin, Iowa, and Minnesota on our slate every year. But the because of our country's demographics, we have higher growth rates in populations of the Maryland-DC-VA area as well as New Jersey compared to Iowa-Minny-Wisco areas. The Maryland-DC-VA / NJ areas also have been pretty fertile recruiting bases as well. The shift here (although losing more traditional rivalries) will only benefit Michigan in terms of recruiting.

Think about it, we're going after players in the mid-atlantic region way more than we are reaching out to Wisconsin and Minnesota for players. Selling Michigan to these recruits and their families, knowing they'll be able to player Rutgers/Maryland/PSU on the east coash will help us out in the long run.

And 25 years ago we had to play Wisconsin, who were pretty damn awful. It only takes one good coach to come along and turn a program like Maryland or Rutgers into the next Wisconsin under Alvarez/MSU under Dantonio/Purdue under Tiller etc.

Wow. You were able to select a list of the 10-15 programs that have improved over the past 30 years, made no real factual comparisons to the current Rutgers/MD situation, and exclaimed that "See, some bad teams become good.... so Rutgers and Maryland will be good!" And people agreed with you. Rutgers could also turn into Boston College and be the most "Meh" game you'll ever see. "Hey fellow undergraduate friends, who wants to road trip to Madison to watch some good, Midwestern Big Ten football?" > "Hey, lets roadtrip to.... is Rutgers in New Jersey somewhere, right... and watch Michigan play a team we have 0 care about." Or Maryland can become Kentucky... hey they had more than 3 conference wins one year in the past decade... right? Or hell, maybe the Big Ten will get LUCKY and Rutgers will acheive NC State-like success... with 4-5 conference wins a year.

For MSU to win their division they're almost assuredly going to have to beat at least 2 out of the three of us, OSU, and PSU. They may never go back to the Rose Bowl if they don't do it this year.

And as said by MGoShoe, no silly protected crossover games, where we get MSU and Ohio State gets Illinois or something. There will always be some unbalance, but this eliminates it in the best way possible.

I hate those stupid protected cross-overs so I like these. We get to keep our rivalries and stay on the same competative balance with them as well. If MSU would have went West, I would have preferred to give them the middle finger and said "see you in four years." I'm not gonna lie, this seems to give MSU a tougher road to success, and sending MSU back to the salt mines needs to be the first thing UM needs to do to make sure the state of Michigan is a fertile ground for UM in the future.

I doubt they're going to protect anything other than PU v. IU because protected crossovers create inherent and long-running competitive imbalance within the divisions (the main problem with splitting OSU and Michigan). In the situation outlined above, you're giving Michigan and OSU near autowins most years while committing PSU and MSU into games that will normally be toss-ups. Totally abandoning them, other than IU-PU, is best for competitive balance within the divisions. And for the most part, you just end up with a bunch of "rivalry" games that fans aren't invested in (BHGP has been predictably hilarious in labeling Purdue "Our Most Hated Rival" or OMHR to mock the abitrary crossover they were thrown into).

PU-IU can stay because it's almost never going to matter in the division races.

But after decades of having OSU as our protected rival, it would be funny to see us get the protected rivalry break and see others have a hard time. I thought it would be hard for MSU to win the division before...if they have to play Wisconsin every year too? That would be funny stuff. And might make Nebraska actually have a bit of a tougher road. But I'll take it as it is.

because its closer to michigan and chicago and is a good easy trip, IU is fine too though. hopefully this means that they plan on eliminating protected cross over games, meaning each team would play a team from the other division every 2 or so years (7 teams for 3 spots per year) as opposed to every three years (6 teams for 2 spots). it would be more frequent at least and might make up for having to face the putrid new members every year.

I don't like that we're in a significantly more difficult division than the west, but it seems like Michigan and Ohio will be the teams to beat moving forward and I do like that we're in a division together.

There's no realistic senario that would have seen UM play in an easy division or schedule where we would be a shoe-in for the division most of the time. Thus, the best case senario would be for us to have our rivals, and the other big programs in the B1G have to slug it out with each other so the big boys (and MSU) would all be in the same boat. This divisonal alignment is pretty much that. Nebraska is the clear winner here, but eh, whatever. I don't hate them. I wouldn't mind seeing them in Indy.

This is encouraging news, because it leaves open the possibility for us to have a protected rivalry with Minnesota. If the addition of Rutgers and Maryland means that everyone gets their geopraphic rivals in the same division while we get to play the Brown Jug every year, I'll consider a bullet dodged as a Michigan fan.

The hell does "High Point Solutions" even sell? You know it's bad when you can't even get your stadium sponsored by a real company. How much are sponsorship rights? Michigan should just go alpha on Rutgers and buy the naming rights, "The Big House - East."

I say put Indiana in the East. Considering this alignment is a short term thing until the next expansion, I want to see Indiana going up against MSU and OSU. Why? Because the offensive system Wilson runs with the spread, quick passing attack is one of the ways to beat quarters coverage which is what MSU runs and what OSU is switching to. Thus, more chance of both of those teams losing and interdivision game (as we saw by Indiana giving both teams scares last year). Am I overthinking this? Maybe.

IIRC, the division are limited to football only since there are so many less games. For Basketball I'd assume we'd continue to do something as close to a round-robin as possible, or similar to how the schedule games currently.

Their basketball program has a storied history. Len Bias? Steve Francis? Len Elmore anyone? Indiana should go west. Too much storied tradition in one grouping and not enough in the other is not good over the long haul. On the football side lesser impact although Purdue is clearly the "better" program.

The only benefit I see the conference gaining from divisional format in basketball is reduced travel cost, but the total lack of balance in competitiveness isn't worth it. Last I heard there were rumors that the Big Ten did want to expand to a 20 game conference slate to welcome Rutgers and Maryland.

We pulled DG and are now in on Da'Shawn Hand who we all know are both from VA. Being able to tell them (and all of the other D1 recruits that come out of VA every year) that we play in MD, PA and NJ every season will surely make it easier to commit to play in Ann Arbor

Same would apply to other recruits from Maryland and Pennsylvania as well. I'd imagine OSU and Michigan will have a stronger pull on east coast guys from here on

I agree, would much rather play Wisconsin/Iowa/Minnesota/Illinois... well, pretty much anyone besides Maryland or Rutgers, but with Big Ten money coming in their football programs should improve. Not sure if they will ever compete with the best in the conference, but improve nonetheless.

Has to be jumping up and down with joy right now. Northwestern has to pretty happy as well. This almost guarantees a 40 some % chance of a big ten title game each year, for the next 5 give or take, before the season even starts.

By not administering daylight savings time, Indiana was in either time zone for half the year. This debate about which one should be grouped with schools in the other time zone wouldn't be happening if they had just stuck with it. I'll bet the state legislature feels silly now for giving into the man.

It's more difficult, sure. But with ND going off the schedule for some length of time, I like having PSU step in as the future third rivalry to eventually replace them. I don't think they're going to be down for long either, assuming they can get someone quality to replace O'Brien when he leaves. And I think the sanctions are reduced some time in the next year. I also believe Sparty is brought back down quickly (though unfortunately they'll still have a good defense next season), evening out the competition.

One tough game against PSU (when they bounce back) and one very tough game against Ohio isn't that much, again considering ND is off the schedule.

Completely basing this on my bias, being that I live in St Louis now I hate Michigan being in the East Division. I travel to a lot of games, but Pennsylvania, New Jersey, and Maryland aren't exactly in driving distance. Sadly I hope they add 2 more teams and do it by competitive balance. As of right now I see the East Division being like the Big 12 South division was and running the conference.

Michigan has won one National Championship in my lifetime. I'm all for change if it means that the Wolverines have a better chance of winning another one while I am still alive. Statistically, I should live another 20 years or so. If I am lucky, I will be fully aware of my surroundings most of those years.

So, simply from a selfish standpoint, I like these changes. The game is moving toward a model with super-conferences and a bona fide playoff. The Big Ten's recruiting footprint is about to expand, and could expand even more if they go to GA and/or FL for their next members.

I would prefer a couple more potential tomato cans, but I would be the happiest to see a model where the Big Ten champion has a chance to "tee it up" on a neutral field with a chance to win a true National Championship at the end of the season.

The East is the tougher division, but we are still better off. I had nightmares about Ohio State and Penn State being the glamor programs in the talent-rich and media-centered East, while we languished isolated in the West with Sparty.

Hey Big Ten, thanks for finally listening and doing what us lowly fans have been pleading with you to do for two years! Thanks again. Much appreciated.

Ha! Ha! Just kidding. We know that the fans are the furthest thing from your mind and you are really doing this so that you can get the BTN on NY/NJ and DC/Baltimore basic cable by offering up Michigan and Ohio State on an every-year basis. It's all about the money.

I guess we just got lucky that common sense and B1G $$$ happened to align by chance.

To all the posters lamenting the fact that the East is clearly tougher: who cares?

Winning a B1G championship is approximately equally difficult no matter which division we are in. If the East is tougher, then it's harder for us to make the B1G championship game, but it's easier for us to win it since the team coming out of the West will be weaker. The only way an imbalance in divisional strength hurts is if you care about how many B1G championship games we make, not how many we win.

Considering our real rivalries (sorry, Minnesota) are with two of the better teams in the B1G, there is no way to both play them every year and avoid competing with them for a divisional crown every year. I'd rather have it this way than have us play OSU, have MSU play Indiana, and compare our records at the end of the year.

This likely is a strange and unscientific way of doing it, but I took the records of all these schools since 2000 and managed to get an average performance for each, and then put each team as well as the average season record into their proposed divisions as if it were a hyopthetical season.

If Purdue is in the East, there is noted imbalance in the overall historic performance - this hypothetical division would have a win percentage of 0.620, compared to Indiana dragging the West down a bit with 0.544 overall.

If you switch the two schools and put Indiana in the East, suddenly the East has only a slight edge - 0.588 to 0.576, to be exact. It seems to lend a little credence to the notion of competitive parity among divisions and division members (for in that scenario, Illinois is the only team in the West averaging a sub-.400 season) as an argument for putting Indiana in the East. Obviously, however, it isn't the only consideration.

In the end, I suspect we'll see Purdue in the west with Indiana in the east for the short-term future while the conference is still at 14 teams.

If the B1G goes to 16 teams (say Virginia and North Carolina) and both programs come from the ACC, then Indiana will probably head west if the conference opts to use a setup with two permanent 8-team divisions.

if the B1G goes to four 4-team pods, then we'd likely see the following:

Pod A - Nebraska, Iowa, Minnesota, Wisconsin

Pod B - Indiana, Purdue, Illinois, Northwestern

Pod C - Michigan, Michigan State, Ohio State, Penn State

Pod D - Rutgers, Maryland, Virginia, North Carolina

Like the WAC from the mid-90s two pods (A & C) would be permanently assigned to two different division while pods B & D rotate between the two divisions. Teams would play the three other programs in their pod each year and the teams in the other pods two times every four years.

If the B1G goes to 18 teams (add Duke and Georgia Tech) with both programs coming from the ACC, then the B1G can have two 9-team divisions:

If the conference opts to go to ten conference games with this lineup, it means it'll take ten years to cycle through the teams in the west if home-and-home series are scheduled.

With ten conference games and a pod system, the rotation is much quicker---just under six years to make sure each team plays the other twice. We'd have two 5-team pods and two 4-team pods with the two smaller pods rotating between divisions:

Pod A - Nebraska, Wisconsin, Minnesota, Iowa, Michigan State

Pod B - Illinois, Northwestern, Indiana, Purdue

Pod C - Michigan, Ohio State, Penn State, Rutgers, Maryland

Pod D - Georgia Tech, Duke, North Carolina, Virginia

If the Big Ten were to go to 20 teams (add Florida State and Notre Dame), then it's very likely a pod system with four 5-team pods would be in place. It would take six years for every team to play one another home-and-home with divisions rotating every two years with a nine-game conference schedule.

Feels like IU. Otherwise, the worst team in the East is probably Rutgers or Maryland, two teams that would be in the top half of the other division. Sucks for IU, but Purdue along with everyone else would be insane.

I actually think IU is going to be better than Purdue if they can hold on to Wilson. Right now, they're the only Big 10 team running a variation of the Air Raid. It's a fun system to play and it's shown it can turn middlling recruits into big stat quarterbacks. They played OSU and MSU very close last year. Now, it's doubtful they ever recruit enough D to contend (and this may cost them Wilson if he can get them to mediocre) but their offense is going to be good enough to be a pain to play against.

As for Purdue, people say Hazel is a good coach but the last Tressel -> MAC -> Big 10 offensive coach (Beckman) has been a total flop. I'm in wait and see mode about him.

I'd like to comment that I am very glad Northwestern is not in our division. They are the team I most like to cheer for besides Michigan, and now that they aren't in our division, it is easier to do. Also, I really believe they are on an upswing and will more often than not be in the divisional championship discussion with who is currently in that division. I see Wiscy moving back down, Nebraska being the top team, and a bunch of very average teams that will produce a good team on occassion.

first one being how ironic that after only 2 years in the league, we'd end up in the most "old school" division of the B1G, with 6 of the conference's 7 oldest members, while the East will have 5 of the 6 newest members (if you consider OSU's 1912 entry as "new").

Second, I'll personally miss having Michigan as our main competitive rival within the division. Wisconsin has done quite well lately--better than NU or UM the last 10 years--but it's a lot more fun competing against a program that measures its success over a century. I think most Nebraska fans feel the same. But we're really not attached to any particular B1G team and good for Michigan getting The Game back the way you want it.

Third, give me another red team to play against, this will be our first year we get to play Indiana, would hate to see that taken away after only 1 game. This year's schedule with them and Illinois will definitely help our chances of repeating in the Legends.

As far as overall divisional strength, I side with those that say go with geography and let the power balance ebb and flow over time.

Look forward to competing with you guys this year and I always enjoy the posting and content on mgoblog, there's always something worth reading including lots of non-sports topics.

I'm glad we get to be in same division as ohio, but Nebraska is the only traditional power in the west while we have us, ohio and PSU and you never know what sparty can do, they're not as shitty a program as they used to be.

I would have preferred PSU in a division with Neb somehow, I think this mostly sucks unless the 2 new schools that could potentially join the B1G are good football programs and they get put in the west. We shall see.